Khao Khitchakut National Park

Forested mountain with a sacred footprint at the summit

Khao Khitchakut is a forested mountain about an hour's drive north of Chantaburi, sacred to Thai Buddhists because a large rock at the summit bears what is believed to be a footprint of the Buddha. For sixty days a year — beginning on the first day of the third lunar month and ending in early March — the park opens at night for the pilgrimage, and tens of thousands of people climb the steep trail by torchlight to reach the summit at dawn.

The rest of the year the park is quiet hiking territory, with several other waterfalls, dense evergreen forest, and gibbons in the canopy. The pilgrimage trail is closed off-season; alternative trails are open.

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The annual pilgrimage to the summit of Khao Khitchakut runs only from late January through early March. For sixty days each year, between thirty and forty thousand pilgrims a day climb the trail through the night to reach the Buddha footprint at dawn. The rest of the year, the park is empty and the trail is closed.

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